City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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Austin Laughlin turned the corner inside Lower Merion’s Kobe Bryant Gymnasium and sprinted down the sideline, trying to outrun the mob. It was the final heroic effort he’d make on a night filled with them, though a fatally flawed one.

Because there was no escaping those chasing him.

Laughlin’s Garnet Valley teammates caught up to the junior guard at halfcourt and surrounded him, screaming, celebrating a shot that might have turned the course of their team’s entire season.

It was a double-clutched, half-court chuck* from just in front of the scorer’s table which dropped shortly after the buzzer sounded, handing the Jags an emotional 68-67 overtime win.

(*Ed. Note: Video contains some NSFW language)

That capped off a wild ride of a game which saw Garnet Valley (12-5, 7-4) come from down five points in the final minute of overtime after earlier erasing a seven-point fourth-quarter deficit against one of the traditionally strong programs in the Central League.

It was a two-point game with four seconds left and the Jags inbounding from under their own basket when Laughlin, as he’d done all game long, took matters into his own hands.

“We were supposed to run a play and I just went to get the ball, I was feeling it,” Laughlin said. “I double-clutched and went up.”

“That was awesome,” he added, unable to come up with anything else to say. “That was awesome.”

“I still just can’t believe he made it, honestly,” senior guard Brandon Starr (16 points) said. “I didn’t know what to do, it was shocking. I knew he was going to take it, I had confidence in him. He practices those shots in practice, because you never know. But I believed that he would make it and I had confidence in him and that’s why we gave him the ball and he had the last shot.”

Even the opposition couldn’t help but give Laughlin his due as the teams were departing for the evening.

“That’s the greatest shot I’ve ever seen live,” one Lower Merion assistant told Laughlin outside the locker rooms. “Helluva performance.”

Laughlin’s shot was the last of the best night of his basketball career.

The 6-foot-2, 160-pound guard dropped a career-high 36 points on 12-of-18 shooting, making six of his eight 3-point attempts. And many of those shots were with a hand in his face, including several tough pull-up baseline jumpers that he drained with authority.

He even hit the shot to set up his game-winner, racing downcourt to drain another 3-pointer to bring his team within 65-64 with five seconds remaining in overtime before a LM free-throw set up his final play.

Oh, and Laughlin also hit the shot that forced overtime, a corner 3-pointer with a minute left in regulation.

“Austin was unconscious tonight, and he does that more often than you would think,” Garnet Valley coach Mike Brown said. “It was appropriate that he made the last shot, with the offensive game that he played.”

"I hit my first couple of shots and I thought everything was going to go in from there," Laughlin said."

He was on fire from the beginning, scoring 15 points in the opening quarter to help Garnet Valley out to a 26-12 lead, though Lower Merion (10-6, 8-3) used sophomore Theo Henry in a very effective defensive role to limit Laughlin to just nine points through the next two quarters.

But thanks to the efforts of senior Terrell Jones (32 points), Lower Merion was within four points at halftime (36-32) and took the lead early in the third quarter on a Henry 3-pointer.

Lower Merion (9-7, 8-3) didn't give up the lead again until the final buzzer. Two of the Aces' three league losses have come at the hands of the Jaguars, who won 65-61 on their home court back in December.

Jones, a 6-4 senior wing, had 21 of his points between the second and third quarter, helping his team score 40 points during those 16 minutes. He finished with a double-double, adding 13 rebounds as well as three blocks and two steals.

Sophomores Jack Forrest (12) and Darryl Taylor (10) joined Jones in double figures.

With the win, Garnet Valley moves one game back of Lower Merion and Strath Haven for third/fourth place in the Central League; thanks to Ridley’s win over previously-unbeaten Conestoga earlier in the day, that fourth-place squad is now guaranteed a spot in the league’s playoffs.

And considering Garnet Valley was 16th in the latest District 1 6A power rankings released Monday -- five spots behind Lower Merion and eight above the cut line -- it’s a win that’ll serve as a boost on several levels.

“We came into tonight only six to go, now only five to go, and we’re right there Central League-wise and district-wise,” Brown said. “ You want to win every game you can, and Lower Merion’s a real good team and beating them in the points system helps a lot; it’s a big, big win for us. To beat them twice in the same year is huge.”